IRGC Self-Exclusion Database Application

BACKGROUND

The Iowa Gaming Association (IGA) is a non-profit organization that was created in 1999 to support the state’s gaming industry. It is an advocate for commercial gaming in Iowa and communicates timely and accurate information about gaming to its members, the public and Iowa’s legislating bodies.

The casino members of the Iowa Gaming Association allowed a person to ban himself/herself from a particular casino. In 2004, a State-wide Voluntary Self-Exclusion Program was created so a person could sign one form and not be allowed at any Iowa licensed casino. The state-wide program option was passed by the Iowa legislature and is part of the industry’s comprehensive responsible gaming initiative. In the 2017 legislative session, they passed a reform bill to allow a person to choose either a 5-year or lifetime irrevocable option.

A person can voluntarily request to be banned from all commercial casinos in Iowa by signing an exclusion form. This form is then distributed to all IGA member casinos. By signing this form, a person agrees to either a 5-year ban, or a lifetime ban that is irrevocable. In either case, while excluded and if discovered at a casino, he/she will forfeit the equivalent dollars of any jackpot, slot credit or chips to the State of Iowa General Fund.

BUSINESS CHALLENGE

The changes to Iowa law in 2017 prompted the need for the self-exclusion database to have four status options:

Lifetime prior to July 2017

Reinstated

5-year Exclusion

Lifetime Irrevocable

This required the existing Self Exclusion Database Application to be upgraded to incorporate above changes. IGA also took this opportunity to undertake complete redevelopment of the database application to the latest software technology stack available. Another notable requirement was to comply with current security standards and to ensure the website and database did not contain any vulnerabilities while allowing member casinos to access the database in a seamless manner.

SOLUTION

eWay Corp won the bid to develop, design and execute a comprehensive upgrade to a database required to maintain an accurate and confidential list of exclusion records. eWay immediately setup a dedicated team to work on the upgrade project. We started by undertaking a detailed study of the requirements – we call this phase Discovery. This included meetings and Q & A on various aspects of the database with stakeholders inside the Association. The user interface required a complete overhaul. This led us into the Design phase wherein designers and UX specialists created prototype wireframes for the application. The prototypes, upon approval by all stakeholders, were then converted to working templates using HTML, CSS and Javascript. We then moved to Development converting the templates into functional ASP.NET code. The database was re-architected, and the legacy data migrated and synced. The Debugging phase followed with our Quality Analysts running test cases to test the functionality and usability of the system. A training program was initiated to educate all member casinos on the new platform and train IGA staff on managing the database. Once the quality checks were passed we deployed the new application to Microsoft Azure Cloud. The application went into production and the system was transitioned to maintenance.

BENEFITS

Application complies with latest legal requirements.

Upgraded to the latest technology stack

Updated security protocols and firewalls setup

Enhanced search system updates

Automatic exclusion notifications

Compatibility with latest standards and browser specifications

Scalable and future ready

TECHNOLOGY STACK

Microsoft ASP.NET MVC framework

Telerik UI for MVC

HTML5, CSS3, Javascript

SQL Azure Database

NoSQL Database

Azure Cloud Services

ABOUT EWAY CORP

eWay Corp is a globally diversified technology solutions provider specializing in Web, Mobile, Custom Product Development, eCommerce, Quality Testing and Cloud Infrastructure Solutions. For over a decade, eWay has been the innovate partner of choice for start-ups and large organizations. As a result of our strategic partnership with Microsoft and Amazon, we are in a position to offer the latest cloud technologies to your business or organization. Through our collaborative, results-driven, customer focussed approach we are able to provide exceptional value to all our customers. Contact us today to know more about how we can help your organization.

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eWay Corp - Prefooter

eWay Corp

eWay Corp is a technology solutions company with more than 12 years experience delivering e-business solutions to small to medium businesses. We provide full-cycle services in the areas of UX, programming and IT infrastructure solutions. Our partnerships with AWS and Microsoft allow us to offer turnkey solutions at affordable costs.